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If true, let's hope it won't follow the fiasco in Wisconsin.
I hope this will happen, but i have a feeling it’ll end up like the wisconsin foxconn factory.

As others have noted, this is a different scenario than Foxconn. Foxconn intended to build LCD panels for TVs and monitors for third-parties and arguably was a speculative investment (more so looking at it now) based on likely very rosy demand forecasts.

The TSMC plant would not be speculative. Apple knows how many CPUs/SoCs they need on a regular basis and this plant will be scaled to help meet that demand. So it will be "right-sized" from the start.


Factory opening no sooner than late 2023 but producing current gen 5nm chips? Seems a bit of a discrepancy there...

Well Apple does tend to recycle older models of ARM processors for their non-Flagship products.
 
Can you provide a link to an article that shows it uses massive amounts of electrical power.

A typical semiconductor fabrication plant, or fab, will use as much power in a year as about 50,000 homes. In fact, the larger “megafabs” can consume more electricity than auto plants and refineries. Some facilities have even built their own captive power plants.

I know these buildings are huge for a reason, cleaning the air so there are few (dust) particles in the air takes a lot of space, also the climate inside should be as stable as possible.

The fab tools themselves requires huge amounts of power, from vacuum pumps, abatement equipment (very nasty gasses are required), thermal processes, etc.

 
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I'm sure dotard in chief will take credit as soon as he finds out about it.
Just waiting for Trump's Tweet taking credit for this.
Didn’t take long for this to go pedantically political.

Great news in my opinion. As others have stated, would be great to see this as the start of a trend to either relocate manufacturing back home or at least to an ally.
 
I wonder if US defense contractors will be able to use this domestic 5nm process?

Don’t mix things together. TSMC is only for consumer electronics, for which being cost-effective is the most important factor. The military industry is a totally different story, anything used there is several generations ahead of what TSMC could ever imagine.
 
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Don’t mix things together. TSMC is only for consumer electronics, for which being cost-effective is the most important factor. The military industry is a totally different story, anything used there is several generations ahead of what TSMC could ever imagine.

Nope. Military and military-qualified lines are often ahead in specialized analog and RF processes, particularly with non-traditional materials like GaN, GaAs, and SiGe, but they don't come anywhere close to matching the capabilities of commercial CMOS silicon.

 
Don’t mix things together. TSMC is only for consumer electronics, for which being cost-effective is the most important factor. The military industry is a totally different story, anything used there is several generations ahead of what TSMC could ever imagine.
From what I have read, chips used by the military usually are several generations behind.
 
Diversification is great. Especially if the most advanced technologies are manufactured here in the US.
 
Correct me if I'm wrong... but TSMC is a chip manufacturer, right? We're talking about silicon.

So I don't know why people are thinking iPhone assembly is coming to the US anytime soon. That's still handled overseas by companies like Foxconn, Pegatron, etc.

As much as I'd love a "Made in the USA" iPhone... this announcement isn't that. :p

You say you would love a “ Made in the USA” iPhone but would you be willing to pay for one? That’s the real question isn’t it.
 
It'll be a nice shot for Arizona's economy, at many levels, considering the large number of employees needed.

I don't know where in Arizona the fab will be built, but suspect there will be some government subsidies involved. Perhaps in property taxes assuming the fab costs at least $15 billion.
 
maybe reading the articles mentioning that the Administration (principally State Dept and Commerce Dept) is the one negotiating with them might help you put things into perspective.

Nice to finally see someone commit to building a semiconductor plant in the U.S.... something which the Obama Administration had been pushing for for a long time.



 
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Factory opening no sooner than late 2023 but producing current gen 5nm chips? Seems a bit of a discrepancy there...

Cutting edge processes will most likely
stay in Taiwan while 5nm will probably have a good long life. 5nm chips aren’t yet in the marketplace and won’t be for another 6 months, so technically, it’s next gen. Regardless, I’m guessing we’ll see Apple-based CPUs in 5nm on the Mac for the next 3-4 years after they are introduced.
 
Nope. Military and military-qualified lines are often ahead in specialized analog and RF processes, particularly with non-traditional materials like GaN, GaAs, and SiGe, but they don't come anywhere close to matching the capabilities of commercial CMOS silicon.

(Sorry for the slow reply, spending quality time with MY chip...)

Yes, the pressure cooker of commercial CMOS is an amazing thing for digital design.

And the EUV manufacturing processes needed for 5nm are amazingly complicated, expensive, power-hungry, and currently (so far as I know) low-yield for big parts.

Now as to if TSMC CMOS can be made rad-hard, well....
 
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I'm sure dotard in chief will take credit as soon as he finds out about it.
and if Obama was president, you'd be saying "Thank you, Obama!", no doubt. This is how foolish-looking politics can make a person.

To be clear: I'm not giving Trump all the credit. The fact is that while many of his policies were clearly good for business, it's the free market itself which inevitably generates wealth, and deserves the lion's share of that credit. Even bad economic policies can potentially lead to growth if the free market manages to find a profitable workaround, which happens as well.
 
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Nope. It's one of the longest running stories in America: money for nothing! Socialism for the Business Class/Crony Capitalism.

I totally agree with your disgust regarding Crony Capitalism. (And it really isn't ANY form of "capitalism" if it involves forced taking from one group to subsidize another.)

BUT - think of this one more as munitions. My dad - a businessman and an engineer - always taught me that free and global markets are usually good things (*), but that all countries must be able to feed and militarily defend their populace no matter what.

Having a good leading edge foundry-model fab on our soil goes to the latter. Intel's fabs are competitive, but they've typically not open for independent designers to use. Also, "Two is one, one is none."

(*: "free and global markets are usually good things" - this was before we gave "most favored nation" trading status to slime ball countries that abuse and imprison their citizens, and poison the planet, just because they're cheap.)
 
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